SIPP or company pension?

dunstonh

I am in a similar situation. I have an old company group pension with the prudential and after much faffing I was told first that I'd be able to make payments from the company, and then after 6 months of doing so, was told that I couldn't. Feel quite messed around by the pru.

You say old. This suggests it is from before 2013. Many old plans from before then cannot be topped up or have a new contribution to them. Some can but not all.

I have to say that it's not been the easiest experience and I wonder what other small companies have had to do with pension auto enrollment.

They use a provider that caters for the person wanting to DIY. The market is effectively split between DIY or advised. The providers you contacted were the advised channels. You need to contact the DIY providers.

There are several small auto-enrolment scheme providers. Although auto-enrolment is not required in this case.

honestsammy

Thanks for the info.

Yes I think the pension was opened a few years before. I had called Pru a few times to make sure if I could make employer contributions and how I would go about it. I started making those payments for a few months before I noticed I was getting tax relief. After a few more weeks of toing and froing they finally said I couldnt make employer contributions at all. Waste of everyone's time really.

I contacted those companies because those were the ones I was familiar with. I had discounted sipps because I wanted something familiar.

honestsammy

I think what I've learned here is that if you want to do everything yourself then realistically your only option is a sipp. What I didn't realise is that a sipp is more or less as my previous pensions anyway, as I was choosing the funds I was invested in.